aiqbench analysis
This study clarifies that the performance gains from modeling full distributions in regression tasks stem primarily from optimization improvements rather than the extraction of additional information. The proposed Histogram Loss method achieves these benefits in standard deep learning applications without requiring expensive hyperparameter tuning.
Investigating the Histogram Loss in Regression
arXiv:2402.13425v3 Announce Type: replace Abstract: It is becoming increasingly common in regression to train neural networks that model the entire distribution even if only the mean is required for prediction. This additional modeling often comes with performance gain and the reasons behind the improvement are not fully known. This paper investigates a recent approach to regression, the Histogram Loss, which involves learning the conditional distribution of the target variable by minimizing the cross-entropy between a target distribution and a flexible histogram prediction. We design theoretical and empirical analyses to determine why and when this performance gain appears, and how different components of the loss contribute to it. Our results suggest that the benefits of learning distributions in this setup come from improvements in optimization rather than modelling extra information. We then demonstrate the viability of the Histogram Loss in common deep learning applications without a need for costly hyperparameter tuning.
Abstract:It is becoming increasingly common in regression to train neural networks that model the entire distribution even if only the mean is required for prediction. This additional modeling often comes with performance gain and the reasons behind the improvement are not fully known. This paper investigates a recent approach to regression, the Histogram Loss, which involves learning the conditional distribution of the target variable by minimizing the cross-entropy between a target distribution and a flexible histogram prediction. We design theoretical and empirical analyses to determine why and when this performance gain appears, and how different components of the loss contribute to it. Our results suggest that the benefits of learning distributions in this setup come from improvements in optimization rather than modelling extra information. We then demonstrate the viability of the Histogram Loss in common deep learning applications without a need for costly hyperparameter tuning.
Machine Learning (cs.LG); Artificial Intelligence (cs.AI); Machine Learning (stat.ML)
arXiv:2402.13425 [cs.LG]
(or arXiv:2402.13425v3 [cs.LG] for this version)
Full text under the publisher's open licence · 162 words
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